In the season finale of The Magicians, which aired tonight on Syfy, we learned that after Ember (Dominic Burgess) and Umber (Nico Evers-Swindell) were killed, someone was sent to take away all the magic in Fillory and on earth. When SciFi Vision recently talked to members of the cast, including Hale Appleman, who plays Eliot, Brittany Curran, who plays Fen, Arjun Gupta, who plays Penny, and Rick Worthy, who plays Dean Fogg, they talked about how they felt their characters would deal with the situation.

**Spoilers for 2.13**

Ember and Umber may be gone, but without magic, Eliot must still try to rule Fillory and keep everyone calm and safe. Appleman wasn’t sure how Eliot would deal with the situation, but hopes that the lack of magic will inspire him to figure it out.“I don't know. I hope that Eliot is becoming more self-sufficient, and I think that there were experiences in season two, like the battle, and, you know, his growing emotional understanding of the world around him. He's starting to have more empathy with other people, because he's less focused on himself, and I think that those are really important building blocks for him as a character and a person in the world. And my hope is that he continues in that direction in season three and that the lack of magic will inspire him to rise to the occasion even more and become a true hero.”

Eliot’s wife, Fen, may not be a monarch, or even have magic, but she still would be affected, as she’s grown up with it all around her. According to Curran, “I think that will be hard for Fen, because it's just a part of her life. It's not like this fun, "Ooh it's a magic trick;" it's truly a part of life in Fillory. It's like on earth all of a sudden, I don't know; I can't even think of an example - like music going away, or something that's just like a part of who we are. I think it would be hard, even though Fen doesn't use magic.

“I don't think Fen's going to handle it very well at first, because of all the reasons that I said, but I don't know. Fen's a fighter, even if not literally, and I think she's just able to make sacrifices and see the positive side of things regardless of what she ultimately wants. So I think she'd ultimately be able to hand it, but it would be a really rough road to go down. I didn't even think about that.

“Although I wonder if she can use magic and just chooses not to, because I know in the books [she does]. I'm wondering; I really want to do magic, because when I come back to LA, all my friends are always asking me to teach them tuts, and I'm like, "I don't do magic on the show; I'm sorry." But yeah, in the books, I think Fen uses magic, and at the last second we find out that she can use it, she just chooses not to. So I'm not sure if it's the same for me, but God I hope so, because I want to do magic so bad.”

Whether still in the Library or back on earth, if Penny survives, he will have to deal with having no magic as well, but he may be better equipped to deal with it, since he’s already been struggling with the loss of his magic for a while now. Gupta told the site, “I think for Penny's it's always going to be easier to adjust than any of the characters, because I think he's had to deal with the worst. I think he and Eliot (Hale Appleman) have. Eliot probably had the worst emotionally trying circumstances as a child, but I think Penny had the most logistic. I mean, I think he was on his own quite literally, fending for himself for most of his life. So I think that he will adjust just fine.

“But he has this "cancer plus," and we don't know anything that happens at the end of the season. We see all the other characters, but we don't see where Penny is, so it's an interesting choice that the writers have made to kind of hopefully set up something that's very fun and exciting.”

Worthy thinks that a lot will be different at Brakebills without magic, and people will have to start over. “I think it's going to be like the beginning of everything all over again. And you really just made me think about it; for some reason, I just had a flashback of Battlestar Galactica.

“I think it's at the end of season two, and everything has just gone to hell. [laughs] They're trying to figure out how to break free not only from the Cylons, but this ridiculous horrific political dictatorship that's now in place. I forget; I think it's New Caprica.

“Long story short, all the characters change. Like Adama (Edward James Olmos)'s son (Jamie Bamber) picks up like fifty pounds. Adama looks rough, and he's grown a mustache, and he just looks like there's no hope.

And I think what we're going to see is something similar in that, in like, what do we have left? It's like not only is magic dying, but it looks like it's dead. It's gone.

“But I think there's going to be a glimmer of hope that will reinvigorate all of us.

I haven't seen any of the scripts for season three, but I think we're going to have to relearn how to trust everyone again and start over. They won't need me as much as I will need them, and I think that's a good place for the beginning of season three.”

Be sure to read more of what these cast members had to say in our other recent interviews, and tune into Syfy in 2018 for season three of The Magicians.